GCousino

I grew up with a functioning alcoholic mom who never went into treatment, relapsed too many times to count, and no one outside of house knew about her addiction. My dad would threaten to leave, she'd stop, then restart...I always knew my dad would never leave and he never did. I lived my entire young adult life and even now literally asking myself every time I drank, "is this the drink that will turn me into my mom".

Move forward to 2.5 years ago and I learn my depressed, anxious, paranoid husband is addicted to pain pills. We have been up and down and I finally have a date that I will serve him for a divorce and I have just realized something profound. All these years I worked to not become my mom, and I actually have become my dad. The codependent, enabling, and emotionally abused spouse! I thought I was strong and knew about addiction. I knew virtually nothing until I came to this site and appreciate the knowledge immensely.

Thank You All!!

Kialua

Welcome. Very good insight! So glad for your input here. I hope things work out for you.

LiveInPeace

I used to think that I had two choices in life, either I grow up and become my mom or I grow up and become my dad. I then realized I had a third a choice. I could just be me.

GCousino

Thanks Liveinpeace!

2016 is the year I work on becoming me.

Ap052183

I relate to this. My grandma and mother were/are codependent and stayed with/enabled addicts. My whole life I've worried I'd become an addict, but I ended up dating an alcoholic and it really changed me. I had to realize I just chose the other addiction. Books on codependency have helped me a lot.

carolineno

Thank you for this post. I see now that am in much the same way. My mom was seriously mentally ill, yet most of the time her illness went untreated. My dad tried to ...I don't know, shield her and us kids from her reality, keep her in line with brute force, not sure exactly. He basically tried to contain the chaos of her illness. He was in denial. He was also a severe alcoholic. And then mom started to drink too!

Here I am years later, married to a man with serious rage issues, a drug problem, and likely depression, he won't see a mental health professional. So I've been trying to keep things going, I guess I've been in denial too. I turned into my Dad! Thankfully, I live without the alcoholism, but I've found myself turning to things to "numb out." Thank you for shining a light on this.